SEPTA

The original Philadelphia subway opened in 1907 as the Market Street
Subway-Elevated line, with that first section operating between center
city and 69th Street. In 1922, the Frankford Elevated was connected to
the Market Street line and the Market Frankford "El" was born. It stretches
underground from Front Street to 46th, and is elevated everywhere else.

The
original Philadelphia Broad Street Line opened on September 1, 1928. This
first section of the Broad Street Line shuttled passengers six miles to
points between City Hall and Olney Avenue. Round trip fare was a whopping
15 cents. Two years later, the line was extended farther south, to South
Street. By 1938, the Broad Street Line stretched all the way to Snyder
Avenue in South Philadelphia. In the mid-1950s, the northern portion was
extended to Fern Rock, and in 1973, the South Philadelphia stadium complex
dictated an extension to Pattison Avenue. Today, the Broad Street Line
uses 35 miles of track to cover 11.5 mile stretch.

In 1967, an underground subway station was constructed at the intersection
of Roosevelt Boulevard and Adams Avenue at a cost of nearly a million
dollars. It was intended to become a huge transit terminal for the growing
corridor between center city and Northeast Philadelphia, with the gigantic
Sears building being the focus of that connector. Economic and political
issues kept the Broad Street line from ever being extended into the northeast,
and eventually the entire project was put to rest. The Roosevelt Boulevard
station lay dark and derelict for decades until it was destroyed during
the implosion of the Sears building in the mid-1990s.

SEPTA
serves five counties in Pennsylvania: Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery,
and Philadelphia. It also provides regional rail service to Trenton, New
Jersey and Newark, Delaware. SPETA's service area covers nearly 4 million
people.

SEPTA is the sixth largest public transportation operator in the country,
with combined operating and capital budgets of more than $1.3 billion
per year. SEPTA employs nearly 9,000 people.

Before City Hall, Penn Square had been used as a public hanging ground,
and later, a water pumping station.

The clock in the tower weighs 50 tons and the second hand travels 114.7
miles in one year.